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Thursday, December 8, 2016

A Reminder to Those Caught Up in Their One Man Show

The following are basic human, religious and spiritual rights any person has as a member of EVEN the Restored, Philadelphia , Living and Continuing Churches of God .

You have the right to expect the church to keep your personal contributions private and should be able to expect that any who deal with such things for accounting purposes will do the same.

You have the right to expect that your membership in any church or congregation is not contingent on how much you give or do not give. You should also expect that jobs, positions, opportunities or offices are not given based on the amount anyone gives to the church.

You have the right to say I can only give this even if it is not a tithe of your income gross or net.

You have the right not to be spiritually judged or have your loyalty or sincerity questioned based on what you are able or unable to give financially to the church.

You have the right to ask a Pastor if he checks tithes and offerings for any of the above reasons before giving to a church.

You have the right to say "I'm tired and won't be there, " to any and all activities, plays, fundraisers, studies, seminars, prayer groups, rehearsals, practices and sermons.

You have the right to say "I don't care about that."

You have the right to question the advice, counsel or sermon of any minister, elder, deacon or any other person in authority. You have the right to question authority and to still expect to be allowed to attend your church. You have the right to question a minister who declares himself one or both of the Two Witnesses of Revelation, a Prophet, the Supreme Watcher of Mankind for God, The Only True Apostle in this Age and any other title or position he can come up with to impress you as to why you need to support him.

You have the right to suggest a pastor get spiritual or psychological help should the need arise. You have the right tell him that the congregation is noticing a trend here.

You have the right to ask why the church believes what it does when the Bible might say otherwise, or why the Bible says something that the church practices that seems scary, weird, inappropriate for this time, out of date or controlling. You have the right to notice that ministers often quote scriptures out of context or fail to enforce or address the rest of the story that does not agree with the point they are trying to make.

You have the right to ask all the "how can that be," "how could that happen," "why does it say this here and that there," questions you can come up and expect an intelligent answer. If you are told that you are using human reasoning, ask the pastor what kind of reasoning he uses. If he says "God's," find another church.

You have the right to not want elders, deacons or your friends accompanying the minister on visits to your home to talk to you.

You have the right to discuss or not discuss your life with the minister as you see fit.

You have the right to expect absolute confidentiality and for your story not to show up in the sermon next week, even though "I won't say the name."

You have a right to be called ahead of time when the pastor wants to ask about stopping over.

You have the right, when he calls to say, "I'm tired," "I'm busy," "No, but I appreciate the call," without repercussions.

You have the right to keep a dirty home, grass not mowed perfectly, an older car, red in color and kids that don't say "yes sir, nice to see you sir," in just the right way.

You have the right to watch and read what you wish even if the pastor just got done bashing that particular program, movie or book from the pulpit in his sermon on "Demons in Your Home--Six Ways to Assure Your Eternal Death."

You have the right to ask the pastor not to call on you at work, even if you own the business.

You have the right to say, "I can't afford to take you to lunch." "I can't afford to give you free wood or brick." "I can't afford to fix your house up free," "I can't fix all your teeth," to your pastor should he expect professional courtesies, even if he offers to do your funeral free.

You have a right to expect free use of your church for weddings and funerals.

You have the right to expect these usages are not dependent on you, your parents or children living a sinless life six months prior to the date of the event.

You have the right not to answer questions your pastor may ask you or your children about your sexual practices. If he insists, then insist that you all share together.

You have the right to not let the pastor inform you as to who you can and cannot date or marry.

You have the right to enjoy your sexuality free of church or pastoral approval. Something that is wrong for the pastor is not necessarily wrong for you in how you express yourself to your partner. There is no Bible prohibition against....well you know. And if there were, you'd have the right to disagree with that too.

You have the right to not share which or if you are taking medications of any sort with the pastor.

You have the right to take such medication and not be judged as having a lack of faith or trust in God to heal you.

You have the right to seek professional help without informing your Pastor of the nature of the help and you have the right to not be helped solely by the pastor under threat of repercussions.

You have the right to insist the pastor get professional help should the need arise and the man is causing more harm than good. You have the right to remind him that God does not directly speak to him nor express His will only through the mind of the pastor and that makes you uncomfortable if he thinks that is so.

You have the right to be wrong about a many things.

You have the right to believe you are correct about many things without repercussions.You have the right not to care about everything that others think you must care about to be a good Christian.

You have the right to tell the pastor he is wrong, mistaken or exaggerating.

You have the right to dress as you wish, wear the jewelry you wish and make up you wish or not wish without being labeled a whore or a goody goody.

You have the right to feel that dressing as if it was still 1957 and only watching Disney Movies or How the West Was Won as proof of your pureness is baloney. You have the right to not be told that the best times for entertainment, movies and TV was when the Pastor was a boy. You have the right to like the food he does not like and to not like the foods he does. You have the right to like the schools he doesn't and not like the ones he does.

You have the right not to bear your soul to the ministers wife.

You have the right to like or not like, agree or not agree with the ministers wife.

You have the right to not view the world through the pastor's eyes morally or politically. You have the right to hate the war while he believes the war in Iraq is God's will and thinks it's all in the Bible.

You have the right to expect him to speak clearly where he thinks the Bible speaks for us today and to walk slowly and drink cool water where it doesn't.

You have the right to tell the pastor that that is his opinion and not necessarily the only true opinion on earth.

You have the right for you, your children, your partner and your friends to be themselves.

These are but a few of the rights any member of any Church, congregation or religious organization has. In short, you have the right to not be required to check your brains, your insights, your perspectives and your free will at the door to be welcome and a member of any church

You have a right to shake the dust off of your feet and walk away from that "man-made" religious organization. The only one that has authority over you is Yeshua and him only.

That is the message Yeshua brought to the people of Jerusalem, that the Pharisee's rules and laws (Judaism) were invalid because they had no authority what soever. In the Hebrew manuscript of Matthew Yeshua told his disciples to do what Moses said and not what the Pharisee's said.

The WCG and splinter groups obey the Pharisee's and not "The Prophet" whom we are to obey. Deuteronomy 18:18-19

The thousands of laws of the Pharisees enslaved the people as the rules and regulations of WCG do to you who are too weak to leave or believe that you will lose your salvation.

This is not a posting about "we ought to obey God/Yhvh/Yeshuah or the Flying Spaghetti Monster instead of man. It is about sitting in church and having your business minded by boundary crossing ministers/elders/deacon and perhaps their wives. Many of the things these churches seek to control in the lives of members are simply none of their business. For example it is none of Bob Thiel's business if you watch and like football. Offsides Bob! That is simply his opinion. It is also just opinion about whether you , in this day and age, can or can't eat out after church, Saturday or Sunday. That is none of anyone's business. It's frankly none of the minister's business if you take exception to some his personal theological claims such as those Dave Pack is wont to do. He can't prove one bit of what he says is so and it simply is not so to be honest, though that is my opinion.

Nothing in any religion can be "proven." That's why it is called "The Faith" You can proof text your way through the Bible until you are blue in the face and it still proves nothing, no matter how you weave and cobble scriptures together to reach one's foregone conclusions and needs.

To paraphrase Hebrews ll:1 "Now faith is the substance of what we hope is so, evidenced by that which we cannot see or prove." It's just that simple and a bit dangerous in the hands of manipulators of scripture such as we see with Pack, Flurry , Meredith etc.

We must obey God and not man comes down to obeying yet another man's view of his god and what he thinks others should obey and the cycle of abuse begins anew. "Thus saith the Lord" as yet another man tells everyone is simply not good enough. I can get that on any mental ward in any city in the world.

December 8, 1:09 pm is the typical church member who would sit back and allow people to be raped and molested and do nothing because they are Gawds ministers. Its of for church leaders to abuse members and treat them like dirt. That has always been the mantra for the church leadership.

There are some terms and conditions when one attends a church service. Any church has a right to impose a dress code for instance, and insist on certain seating arrangements. Restaurants, dances, clubs, etc often have this.The article is right, but fails to warn against rebuking a fool. The bible warns about this, and the fool can be the minister. How can one assert many of these rights, if the ministers can get away with verbally bashing and tearing down church members? The sad reality is members are robbed of many of these rights by the mafia ministers. Note that rights are a taboo topic in church sermons and literature, since the ministers have all rights and members have non.My minister in the WGC would sneer with contempt when I stated that I had rights.

3.21PM I can't help wondering whether church leaders abusing members and treating them like dirt was of Herbies doing. Was he 'punishing' God for not returning in 1975, by vindictively lashing at His followers? Did Herbie turn into a traitorous Antiochus Epiphanes in his old age?

There may be someone around who can answer that. I'd guess it was in the 1950s, as that's when he brought in the makeup rule to get his older daughter to leave.

I remember it was the late 1970s when the rule that the minister must be called "Mister" was to be rigidly enforced. HWA said it had to do with being too informal in his church's youth group back in the 30s or 40s.

The problem with any religion is that time bound principles and reaction to local circumstance or trends become universal laws and regulations.

Until the 1990 's MAKE UP was widely used in the Worldwide church of God by Male Evangelists (who presented the world tomorrow (because of lighting and professional tv standards for format)

Protective measures for women in both the bible and islam are at present turned into oppressive measures and even child molestation. But I can fully understand marrying girls of 14 when the average age of your society is 29 and that of males even lower because of enduring war cycles.

Please interpret any of the Holy Books including 1950's stances on make up by a 1892 born man and dress with standards that apply today. Unless you would like to turn your worship service on a chosen holiday in a toga party. Than I say party on. Or FESTA EST or something.

Ashley, you right. People have a right (and a responsibility) to fear evil people. So they post anonymously. Connies post shows a lack of understanding of rights. Not surprising since it's always been a taboo topic in church. I noticed that the rights in the article were all jumbled. Why are these claims rights, for instance. What scriptures could they quote to justify these rights? When confronted with a thug, there has to be muscle in ones understanding of rights. This article, whilst helpful, doesn't give the required understanding.

Oh of course, we have some COGlodytes who think you do not have the right to restrict COG ministers/elders/deacons from your home, thinking, finances or genitals, apparently. I'm guessing that those are the ones getting defensive on this thread.

Anonymous said...I've been in LCG for 15 years and I most definitely DO NOT have a right to 99% of the things mentioned in this post..."

Of course you do. But obviously as a true believer have given them up

Anon asks: "What scriptures could they quote to justify these rights? "

These aren't Bible rights that one needs to go find scriptures for to justify. These are the kinds of rights every human being has that the Bible and ministries tend to take away for the sake of uniformity and control and of which we need to be reminded of from time to time. The Bible is very plain about obeying both ministry and government as those who watch out for your souls and only punish the evildoer. This, of course, is idealistic rubbish and sometimes we have to call it what it is with rights of thinking, observation and speaking up that the church does not wish one to practice.

GTA always used to say that authority only exists where you choose to accept it. The problem was that choosing not to accept it in the old WCG meant that you were choosing to leave. Fortunately, Jesus made that an easy choice. He didn't return when they said He would in 1975! If your church makes one strike on something that big, they should be out! It means they did not have the witness of God behind them.

Hoss, quoting Jefferson or Franklin is argument from authority. Many church members believe that the 'authority' of their minister superior to Franklin or Jefferson. These same ministers teach that rights are bull.Christ quoted from the bible when tested by Satan. Hence a example of using the bible, is that members have a right to choose their own beliefs since the bible says 'prove all things,' and 'don't lord it over Christians faith.'For Christians, 'cause God says so' is the strongest mental defence against assaults against their rights. Quoting Jefferson etc is weak mental armour by comparison.You didn't give a secular argument as to what are rights, and why rights.

I believe many and perhaps the majority of the membership was not strong enough to claim the space that the bible and also the ministry of wcg allowed.

That's why you have 5% or perhaps 30% percent of former members who are quite content with their association with wcg under hwa. And of course a majority of disgruntled ones.

But wcg was quite good for those who were strong enough to claim their liberty under God.And I don't mean licentiousness at all. And I have seen many cases of mercy in that regard also. (like acceptance of girls with child to sep camps).

But I am with you. Like HWA said. The majority of you are not getting it!!! And he was so right. And he was not mocking. He was just observing that the majority of the church was not able to claim their god given liberties under the administration of god. And of course that was largely due to the faulty system that was set up by illiterate administrators as the administration of God. The Catholic church had 2000 years to sort out a system of governance that satisfies billions of people. Wcg had only 40 years.

Nck, Did you ever attend church? The ministry of WCG did not allow any space. Non. The members that were content with WCG under Herbie were the ministers, their boot lickers, and the church crazies and loonies which the ministers protected. The church was a paradise for psychos or near psychos, which is why Herbie is still revered by many.

What's this nonsense of members "not claiming their God given liberties." Members were robbed of these liberties. They did not request that ministers exercise these liberties for them. Ministers used violence, deception, mind twisting (abusive mind control techniques) to rob blind church members of their God given rights. That you are whitewashing Herbie is disgusting. His 'people don't get it,' was a common left wing expression in the 1940s, for those who disagreed with them. There is no profound understanding behind this expression, which you and his worshippers claim.

The Catholic church is the way it is today because it was stripped of its historic power. It didn't 'sort out its system.'It does not take 40 years for ministers to repent and start to respect members rights. Members who genuinely repent, start to do so immediately.

I am disappointed to see that you are a apologist/whitewasher of a evil church culture.

Most ministurds I knew in WCG were generally loudmouths who actually possessed little in the way of testicles - receiving a single smack would probably have sent them off to cry in the corner. Yet, like any bully who is in fact an overcompensating weakling, they would push until you drew a clear line.

My point is that the "administration" of it all developed over time with growth and other developments. In the early thirties it the evangelical society of the day. Only in the fifties and sixties inexperienced and very young administrators developed their own style to the detriment of many.

I admitted before that it made a huge difference what administrator would have been assigned to your area. The inexperienced youngster only having experienced absolute power or the former doctor or military officer turned pastor with a lot of experience in the real world.

I guess most areas were under the nazis most here experienced and some were extremely liberal toward personal choice on taking polio shots or not going to ac and pursue a technical management career.

With the current popularity of the Catholic Church amongst the masses I am not whitewashing the crusades I am saying they seemed to have found a way and tone that fits todays society. Armstrongism is incapable of that since they are "conservative" in nature especially pertaining to 1900's science that is engraved in their minds. It is a carcass dying off because of their geriatric leadership. But I am a 100 percent sure that dynamic figures in the 2200's will invent a new road to "utopian society" with the bible in hand as has occurred many times since the first edition of said book.

Connie Schmidt said:"You have the right to read and to post on BANNED without fear of consequence."

anon said:"Ashley, you right. People have a right (and a responsibility) to fear evil people. So they post anonymously. Connies post shows a lack of understanding of rights."

anon, you are the one who is confused. Connie's statement "You have the right to read and to post on BANNED without fear of consequence", applys to ALL who post. On several occasions I have witnessed gaslighting by those who don't post anonymously. That's why I choose to not read anything extra into someone's motivation to post anonymously or with a more formal google, disqus, etc. account.